


The Good Old Days and the New Normal

by gypsyweaver



Series: A Tale of Crowns and Coins [14]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Genderfluid Crowley (Good Omens), He/Him Pronouns For Crowley (Good Omens), Heaven is Terrible (Good Omens), Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Nanny Crowley (Good Omens), Post-Canon, Protective Aziraphale (Good Omens), Protective Crowley (Good Omens), She/Her Pronouns for Crowley (Good Omens), soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:01:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24251011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gypsyweaver/pseuds/gypsyweaver
Summary: Flashback, 2018. Aziraphale is adjusting to not having to constantly fear for himself and Crowley. Crowley is going, as Nanny Ashtoreth, to help Warlock Dowling move in to Eton. That chapter of their lives is closing, and the next chapter looks beautiful.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Warlock Dowling, Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley & Warlock Dowling
Series: A Tale of Crowns and Coins [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1684990
Comments: 2
Kudos: 26





	The Good Old Days and the New Normal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Millicent_Hunter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Millicent_Hunter/gifts).



> CW: Still pretty light and fluffy...wait, there's some allusions to dubious consent/drunk sex at the end. Still, very light.

A. Z. Fell’s Bookshop, Soho, London, Just after a lovely meal at the Ritz, Summer 2018

* * *

“Come in, Crowley! Come in!” Aziraphale said, merrily. He felt positively effervescent. Might be the champagne.

“Everything...is back to normal...” Crowley said, nudging a stack of books with the toe of his shoe.

It was a hesitant move. It looked to Aziraphale like he expected a snake to pop out. Funny that, with him BEING a snake and all.

But he had spoken truthfully. Besides a new series of children’s books and a distinct lack of dust, the bookshop was back to normal. It smelled so strongly of oil soap and sun-warmed wood. The heady scent of old leather and new paper rose over all of it, the high note of bookshop fragrance.

It smelled like home.

And all the books were back, unburnt, and many of them looked mended and rebound. And, Aziraphale knew, that a cabinet in his kitchen contained every flavor of cocoa that he could imagine--in paper packets and foil. Sweet, super-sweet, and some redolent with spice.

Crowley’s nudging knocked over a short stack of books, and he swore. Quickly, he bent over, collected the books (a collection of Agatha Christie novels) and stacked them back in their places. He looked up at Aziraphale guiltily, then stood back up, one hand behind his head, trying to look cool.

He chuckled at Crowley. Dear Crowley. Precious Crowley. He was whole and safe. He would continue to be whole and safe. They were both whole and safe. It was over. He would get to keep him. This one, he would get to keep. He could, they could...

“Are you crying, angel?” Crowley asked.

Aziraphale nodded, flushed, and bit his lip. “I’m afraid so, dear boy.”

“Why?”

“Well, it’s over, isn’t it?” he asked, dabbing at his face with the handkerchief that he’d embroidered (gold filigree wings) himself in the 19th century. “Isn’t it, Crowley?”

“Mm...I think so,” he ran a hand through the back of his hair, trying to look cool. Aziraphale had to admit, he did look very cool doing it. “I mean, we ought to see Warlock off to school.”

“Best not, for me,” Aziraphale said, and sobbed into his handkerchief. “If anything were to happen to the boy...”

“What would happen to the boy?” Crowley asked.

“Crowley...they can’t hurt me anymore, of course,” Aziraphale began. “And they’re afraid of you for the same reasons that they’re afraid of me...but Warlock...he’s mortal and just a little boy...”

“You think Heaven would hurt Warlock to...what? Punish you?”

“Yes, I do. Crowley...” There was a shell of pain around the demon’s name as it left Aziraphale’s lips. Wasn’t this every fear he’d ever had, that they would take his demon from him? And, now that his demon was safe, they might take Warlock away? “Crowley, they made me WATCH Sodom burn. Gabriel and Sandalphon, they made me watch...”

Crowley sighed and walked, carefully past the stacks of books to the backroom. Aziraphale followed. They both knew that was where Aziraphale kept the liquors and the wines. The backroom looked cleaner than he’d left it, with a few new touches. His ancient computer had been replaced with something newer, still fairly boxy and unintimidating, but clearly expensive and very executive. Right beside it, there rested a leatherbound binder that had “MANUAL” embossed on the spine.

His bookmending tools gleamed (rust-free and practically unworn--untouched, mint condition, actually) in a cabinet, along with a fancy heavyweight awl that he’d yearned after but never purchased because his old one worked fine. (But, oh, how he’d yearned.)

Crowley sprawled across the red velvet loveseat that Aziraphale had bought and placed in the shop just because he’d known that Crowley would sprawl across it, looking exactly as he did now. 

“Angel, your people are fucked.” Crowley glanced, pointedly, over his shades at Aziraphale. “In case I hadn’t ever said it.”

Aziraphale sighed, and the sigh turned into a nervous titter as he sank into the old wingback chair that no longer groaned under his weight. “They are, oh, they are. Absolutely dreadful.”

“Beelzebub’s cross with me and all, but they’re not gonna go after a kid...even Hastur wouldn’t, I mean not without cause.”

“Being mad at you isn’t ‘cause?’”

“No,” Crowley said. His phone buzzed and he looked down at it. “Warlock got on the plane with his parents. They’re coming back from Megiddo. He had a nightmare that he got eaten by a giant heap of maggots.”

“So...Duke Hastur?”

Crowley opened his mouth and then closed it. He opened it again, and again, it clicked closed. He cleared his throat.

“Well, we are five days away from Warlock moving into Eton, and I told him Nanny Ashtoreth would be there, so Nanny Ashtoreth will be there.” He crossed his arms and looked like a very large (very petulant) child.

Aziraphale smiled at him, the warmest smile that he could muster. His hands folded on each other across his soft belly. Like doves, one wing over the other. Like he’d done once on a high wall above his gate, to protect a demon he’d just met.

“I trust that you know your people. And I know mine. There are angels who are very dangerous to Warlock. But,” he said brightly, holding up a finger. “But a few small miracles should not hurt. I can be certain that my replacement will be absolutely perfect.”

“Make sure they hate slugs and snails and all,” Crowley said, with a sniff. “Those are pests, alright, angel?”

“Alright Crowley. Of course.” Aziraphale was still smiling.

“Got anything worth drinking here?” Crowley asked, a sly half-smile playing on his lips.

“Yes, my dear. Of course,” he said, and went to the wine cabinet. “I believe this is the Moët et Chandon from darling Freddy that we were saving for a special occasion.”

“Nothing more special, I think.” Crowley almost sounded shy, looking up at Aziraphale, those sweet honey-colored eyes finding Aziraphale’s own over the frames of his dark glasses.

_We’re safe. We’re safe. Oh, my beloved. We’re finally safe._

Aziraphale retrieved the bottle and the glasses. “Nothing at all, my dear. Nothing at all could be more special.”

~*~

The next five days were a hectic blur. Aziraphale did, indeed, find an excellent gardener, and Mrs. Dowling was properly saddened by Brother Francis’ news that he was needed back at the monastery. Yet, his replacement was about thirty years younger, and looked a lot finer working shirtless in the summer sun than old Brother Francis.

That young man was no danger at all to Mrs. Dowling’s marriage, being as gay as a treeful of monkeys on nitrous. Still, he was fine to look upon, and incredibly capable besides. A loveless murderer of innocent snails and slugs, and a certified arborist besides.

Absolutely perfect.

Meanwhile, Crowley spent almost every daylight moment with Warlock. He sent updates by text and e-mail--Aziraphale had set up an account and even obtained a somewhat intimidating cellular phone for that purpose. Warlock had five days to shop for his dorm room, and Nanny Ashtoreth was happy to take him from shop to store to mall to boutique.

Eton was really the best place for Warlock. Neither parent paid much attention to the boy who had been their world for the last eleven years. His acceptance had not taken as many miracles (infernal and ethereal) as Aziraphale had assumed. The Dowlings’ name carried weight. It didn’t take a single miracle to convince his parents. They were delighted that their brilliant son’s future looked so very bright.

Crowley assured Aziraphale, in the dark hours after Warlock was safely delivered back to his parents, that he would be an absolute rockstar there.

“He’s an American. He’ll be cool just by existing,” he’d said, sprawled across the crimson velvet of the sofa.

He looked relaxed, replete. Aziraphale had never seen him so calm.

“Quite,” Aziraphale had agreed into his cocoa (Turkish Mocha). Not because he thought Warlock would be instantly cool on the basis of his accent, manner, and clothes, but because he thought Warlock was a fine young man.

Warlock Dowling was a fine young man who would succeed in any arena, no matter what.

The low table between himself and Crowley was scattered with Chinese takeout boxes. All dutifully emptied by Aziraphale, though Crowley had drunk down three quarts of egg-drop soup and eaten a box of eggrolls all by himself.

The day arrived, and Crowley set out in the morning, prim and proper as Nanny Ashtoreth. Aziraphale had opened the door for her and watched her go. A movie that he’d seen ages ago (with Crowley), about a queerly morbid (but loving) family, came to his mind as he watched Nanny Ashtoreth settle herself in the Bentley. The matriarch of that weird and spooky family had said that black was such a cheerful color, and on Crowley, it was.

Aziraphale hadn’t opened the shop that day. He’d begun reading the manual for his new computer. He wanted to finish the damnable thing, making sure that he understood every part and program. Did Crowley read manuals? Aziraphale thought not. He seemed the type to plunge in and only reach for a manual when there was a problem.

So, Aziraphale spent his day reading. And waiting. Sometimes, Aziraphale thought that he spent his whole existence waiting.

Crowley fairly staggered into the backroom of the shop, far later than Aziraphale had expected. He was still dressed as Nanny Ashtoreth.

“I stayed for supper,” he announced. He looked tired, as if he left a very important piece of himself at Eton. With Warlock.

“Oh, I was beginning to wonder,” Aziraphale said, going to Crowley and taking his umbrella. and hat. “How’s our boy doing?”

“Our boy...” Crowley said, and his voice was the gentle flame of a candle. Warm and soft. “He’s...he’s...”

Could demons cry? Aziraphale did not know. He’d never seen Crowley cry. In six thousand years, not one tear shed. He wrapped an easy arm around Crowley’s waist, and pulled him, gently into his arms.

They’d never hugged. (Not sober, at least.)

Crowley crumpled into his arms, allowing Aziraphale to steer him to the sofa and sit down with him.

“He’s brilliant,” Crowley said, finally. He breathed it into Aziraphale’s neck, and Aziraphale held him tighter. “Our boy is brilliant.”

They stayed like that, locked in each other’s arms, silent on the red velvet couch. Aziraphale stroked Crowley’s hair and neck, not realizing that the demon had fallen asleep until his glasses fell askew and he began to snore.

Crowley had not slept since the end of the world, and Aziraphale had no intentions of waking him. He lowered himself, very slowly, onto the sofa and pulled Crowley on top of him.

The motion did not wake him.

Crowley smelled of night-blooming flowers, the perfume that he wore as Nanny Ashtoreth. It mixed nicely with his vaguely reptilian musk. His weight was comfortable, curled as he was across Aziraphale’s body. Aziraphale collected his dark glasses and laid them on top of a stack of books. A quick miracle doused the light, and Aziraphale felt himself fall into a deep slumber--one hand securely around Crowley’s waist and the other cradling his dear head.

His last thought as his conscious mind slipped away was how happy he was, and how lucky. How very, very lucky they both were.

In his dreams, he visited an oyster restaurant in Rome, a surprisingly warm cave in ancient Briton, and his own small bedroom after the bombs ripped London apart in the Second Great War. Each place tasted differently. Excellent red wine and terrible mead and passable lager. But the feel of Crowley’s skin against his, that remained the same. His heat, the way that his body felt (loosened by alcohol, weak and shuddering beneath Aziraphale)--these things did not change. The way that Crowley’s coolness left him as Aziraphale held him down and pushed inside. Crowley’s cries in the dark, the way he gasped out Aziraphale’s name as he drew closer, the dig of his sharp little nails into Aziraphale’s shoulders--those things were constant. As was the terror and the guilt that warred with Aziraphale’s terrible, selfish need.

Aziraphale woke up first. He always did. Unlike the previous three times, he didn’t need to scuttle off. To heal Crowley of the marks of their passion and dress him and make certain that the alcohol obliterated his memory. He didn’t have to leave him in his rented room, in his bedroll, on this very sofa (convinced that Aziraphale retired to bed without him). No, this morning, he would ease Crowley off of his chest, go upstairs to his little kitchen, and make them both omelets and crepes.

Today, they would discuss Warlock and the future. Today, they would begin to live their lives in the sun.

Aziraphale smiled. It was the first day of their new forever, and he couldn’t wait to get started.

**Author's Note:**

> For Millicent_Hunter, who likes my work and has no gifts. Thanks for the support!
> 
> Yes, Freddy Mercury gave them a bottle of Moet et Chandor. Because, of course he did.
> 
> Yes, there will be explanations in the next chapter about the drunk sex.
> 
> Two soft chapters in a row? With another one planned? I'm spoiling y'all. 
> 
> Ah. and I will be putting the smut in the next part. I've never written Ineffable Husbands smut, so I'm excited. Crowley's getting a wahoo!
> 
> Comments and kudos make a supersonic writer of me!


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